What's the psychology behind people who hate tattoos?

Inverse relationship between tattoos and income. That is one reason that normal people don't like them. If somebody is receiving federal aid and they have tattoos, we have essentially paid for them.

messi wrote:

JustWeighingIn wrote:

There is a difference between being defensive and choosing to keep personal decisions personal. I had a point to make, which I think I've made. I'm not on a crusade to bring understanding to anonymous message board posters, nor do I feel the need to explain (justify?) my mindset to anyone at the expense of discussing openly what (for me) isn't meant for random, public consumption. Sorry if that doesn't illuminate things sufficiently enough for you.

Don't understand why your personal reasons are so personal in this anonymous setting. I have never had a tatted guy satisfactorily explain WHY he has tats. The answers are always as vague as yours. Personal reasons doesn't tell us a thing. We are trying to understand the logic, that's all.

Messi is great, probably the greatest soccer player ever, but his tattoos are ugly.

Yes, some people can make them work but usually I just view them the same way I view a young kid who draws on the wall with crayons. Like it's not that I'm super upset with you, it's just that was a nice wall and now you've kinda ruined it and people will think less of our house because it's tacky just because you acted on a impulse (not that you could really help it)

Joker wrote:

https://www.inkedmag.com/girls/100-sexiest-tattooed-women

I see a lot of butterfaces under 10 lbs of spackle, err makeup.

I'm a PhD candidate, and four out of the seven members of my lab, including the professor, have tattoos.

Some of you really need to get out more and interact with a wider group of people. Its obvious a lot of posters here live in a cookie cutter suburb and are scared of anything that isn't vanilla and generic.

I have a doctorate and a decent job. My spouse is high ranking military. We will retire well enough for our needs in the coming years. We both have tattoos in remembrance of a lost loved one. They are a reminder for us, not a statement others. I’m a little surprised by the comments in this thread, but hey, there’s no accounting for personal taste, neither ours nor that of others.

cyclista wrote:

I'm a PhD candidate, and four out of the seven members of my lab, including the professor, have tattoos.

Some of you really need to get out more and interact with a wider group of people. Its obvious a lot of posters here live in a cookie cutter suburb and are scared of anything that isn't vanilla and generic.

Is there anything more generic and vanilla than getting a tattoos? You at least 30 years out of date if you think tat's are remotely edgy...

Look, anecdotally, the women I know who have tattoos often got them after really bad breakups as some sort of empowerment symbol. Or they got matching ones with a boyfriend and then broke up and got an even bigger one over it to cover/change it. Generally when I see a woman with large or many tattoos I think she has emotional baggage.

That said, I do know plenty of normal people with a *small* tattoo somewhere not easily seen that they got to commemorate something, and I think those are still ugly, but harmless.

dadsfadsfdasfdsafdas wrote:

Is there anything more generic and vanilla than getting a tattoos? You at least 30 years out of date if you think tat's are remotely edgy...

Oh no, you misunderstand me. I never said they were edgy - they aren't anymore. But having a pearl-clutching, knee jerk reaction to other people's aesthetic choices certainly is indicative of a sheltered, vanilla life.

I don't hate them but I also don't find a lot of them very attractive.

I also think if you can see them while you are dressed for work it is unprofessional, at least in traditionally white collar businesses.

I'm an executive in the financial sector and no one in upper management at my company has any tattoos that I can see. They aren't strictly forbidden but no one is taken seriously if you have a face tattoo either.

not even that rich wrote:

L. Glanton wrote:

I mean, they don't affect anyone else but the person who has the tattoo. Why do people feel compelled to judge other people on such an arbitrary thing? A desperate need to find a reason to judge someone?

That's not actually true. Most of the people with lots of tattoos are poor. They're expensive and greatly inhibit their career opportunities, which means they stay poor forever.

Some people don't like those people getting tattoos, because they feel the rest of us will have to pick up their slack and subsidize their existence. No man is an island.

and to that point, is it not true that tattoos can be expensive? so, why are people who have very little money, spending what little money they have on tattoos? shouldn't they instead, save for a car, a bike, or food?

an idiot wrote:

I have a doctorate and a decent job. My spouse is high ranking military. We will retire well enough for our needs in the coming years. We both have tattoos in remembrance of a lost loved one. They are a reminder for us, not a statement others. I’m a little surprised by the comments in this thread, but hey, there’s no accounting for personal taste, neither ours nor that of others.

How high are we talking? Colonel? Flag officer?!?!?!

cyclista wrote:

I'm a PhD candidate, and four out of the seven members of my lab, including the professor, have tattoos.

Some of you really need to get out more and interact with a wider group of people. Its obvious a lot of posters here live in a cookie cutter suburb and are scared of anything that isn't vanilla and generic.

How do you know where everyone lives? That's a reckless assumption at best.

Also, tattoos are hardly edgy. I would call them generic actually. Maybe in the 1960s they were edgy.

Times are a changing wrote:

Inverse relationship between tattoos and income. That is one reason that normal people don't like them. If somebody is receiving federal aid and they have tattoos, we have essentially paid for them.

You're conflating income and feelings of security, which is common. It's people with insecurity who will tend to want them. Used to be simply to secure your place on a team, in a military brotherhood, in a prison gang, or as a seaman. Now it applies to any grab bag of what you want to feel a part of because you feel alienated from most anything else.

damaged somehow wrote:

Look, anecdotally, the women I know who have tattoos often got them after really bad breakups as some sort of empowerment symbol. Or they got matching ones with a boyfriend and then broke up and got an even bigger one over it to cover/change it. Generally when I see a woman with large or many tattoos I think she has emotional baggage.

That said, I do know plenty of normal people with a *small* tattoo somewhere not easily seen that they got to commemorate something, and I think those are still ugly, but harmless.

I am reminded of Johnny Depp's "WINONA FOREVER" tattoo which he later had modified to "WINO FOREVER" as captured below:

Most tattoos look bad.

Whatever choice you make in life, some people out there are going to disagree with it. A subset of those people will be assholes. Said assholes feel you owe them an explanation for the choices you make.

Rhodium Nights wrote:How high are we talking? Colonel?

Higher...

If you grew up with control freak parents who never let you express yourself, including forms of rebellious behaviour, you may hate tattoos. You might hate all forms of unorthodox self expression since you were never allowed to experience that part of life. You might resent people for having the guts to do it, when you as an adult, shaped by your childhood, would feel guilty about doing it.

I don't love tattoos, and I don't hate them. I wouldn't get them for myself. I just don't like the idea of etching something permanent on my body that I might not like later. It doesn't seem worth the gamble.